


Would you believe?

by dorcas_gustine



Category: Life on Mars (UK)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-14
Updated: 2010-01-14
Packaged: 2017-10-06 06:45:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dorcas_gustine/pseuds/dorcas_gustine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Would you believe in what I do/When the things that I make are all for you?</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Would you believe?

**Author's Note:**

> Answering one of marsorbiter's [plot bunnies](http://community.livejournal.com/jumping_off/14789.html#cutid11). Not betaed.  
> Title and summary from Roxy Music's Would you believe? (Yes, I really like titling my fics after songs. Shut up.)

Sam looks at the Scotch in his glass as he turns it over in his hands. Up and down it sloshes, and he almost wishes he had ice, so he could see the small cubes go round and round, clinking against one another. But nu-uh, you can't ruin Scotch with ice.

"You gonna finish that?" a hand appears in his vision and snatches the glass away, without even waiting for an answer.

Sam stares at his empty hands for a long moment, trying to figure out the mystery of his missing glass. Then he turns and raises his eyes to look at Gene, who's sitting to his right on the desk, his arse probably making a mess and putting crinkles in his carefully arranged files.

He blinks. "You're still here," he says after a moment.

"You 'ave amazing powers of observation, Sammy-boy," Gene replies. "Have you ever considered a career as a detective?"

"Already am one."

Gene rolls his eyes. "Yeah. I was bein' sarcastic."

"Ah," he nods, and as if by magic the glass reappears in his hands.

Fuller.

"_Oh_!" he exclaims, blinking down at it in wonder.

"God Tyler, you're really daft."

Sam lifts his glass. "A toast," he says, but he remains like that, arm raised, trying to remember what he wanted to celebrate. "To your arse receiving no aggressive male attention."

No wait, that came out wrong.

Gene stares at him for a long moment. "Now Tyler," he says. "I know I'm hard to resist, but I don't really care about your poncey fantasies."

"It's not- I'm not poncey," he replies, miffed. "You started this about arses," he says. "_Your_ arse. In prison. Where it won't go."

Ha, that's it!

"To you not going to jail!" he exclaims with newfound fervour, shooting up from his chair.

He must be drunker than he's thought though, or the room has acquired the disturbing quality of spinning around on him, because he slips and falls sideways. And he probably would have sprawled rather messily on the floor, hadn't Gene grabbed him by his collar and tugged.

He ends up smashed against Gene's chest, half-lying on the desk. His stomach feels like it arrives a minute after the rest of his body, the sensation making him slightly queasy.

He turns his head around to look at the glass still gripped in his hand, and to his dismay he finds it empty. The small pool spreading on the floor is very telling, though.

Damn gravity.

"I give you me best single malt and you waste it like that," Gene's voice rumbles under his ear and it's as if he's everywhere, above him, around him. He presses closer to hear him breathe.

Maybe just a tad poncey, after all.

"What're you doin', Gladys?" the voice booms.

Sam giggles. "You're breathing," he says.

"Bein' pissed makes you awfully perp- persp-" he grunts, "smart."

"I-" Sam starts, but in levering himself up his elbow slips, and he crumples down, smashing his face against Gene's thigh. He fails to get any kind of purchase, continuing his trip groundward and ultimately landing on the floor.

_Hard_.

Damn bloody gravity.

"Ow," he says, softly, to the ceiling. His left shoulder is wet, he's landed in the Scotch.

Above him Gene starts laughing uncontrollably. "Bloody hell, Sam!" he exclaims. "You should get bladdered more often!"

"Shut up!" Sam hisses, grabbing the ankle that's swinging next to his face.

He tugs viciously and Gene loses his balance and falls down as well, hitting his head on the edge of the desk, his elbow against the chair.

Sam has never heard anybody cursing so much in just one intake of breath.

And now Gene is sitting on the floor, back against the desk drawers, one knee painfully thrust against Sam's ribs, his other leg carelessly thrown over Sam's chest, making it almost difficult to breathe.

Sam wonders how they've ended up like this.

Oh, yeah.

"There was a moment," he says. "When I thought you really were going to jail."

"You thought I was a bloody murderer," Gene says, but his voice is calm, the accusing tone of earlier completely absent, now. He sounds tired.

"No," Sam shakes his head. "I thought you were going to jail."

"But I didn't."

"No, you didn't." He raises his glass again. "A toast."

Gene snorts and lifts his leg from his chest to prod at his side with the tip of his white loafer. "Shut up, Tyler."

"Guv," Sam says, after a moment, because the question has been nagging at him, and tormenting him ever since last night. "What made you change your mind?"

"What're you talkin' about?"

"The envelope Haslam gave you," he says, tearing his eyes away from the ceiling to fix them on Gene.

His Guv stares back at him, and in the half-lit squad room Sam guesses more than catches the glimpse of something in his green eyes.

"I already told you that," he replies curtly.

"Tell me again, then."

Gene shakes his head and looks away.

"Guv?" he asks again, when the answer doesn't come.

"If you don't know that," Gene snorts, and doesn't finish.

"Tell me, please," he pleads. "Gene."

He needs to _know_, he needs to see he's making a difference here, somehow; he needs to have the proof that all of his efforts aren't in vain, that he isn't fighting a lost battle. Like Crane, like Joni.

Like his father.

Gene takes a deep breath, but still doesn't say anything.

"Please," he repeats, whispering. "I need to know."

"Because you're a pesterin' little bugger, Tyler!" Gene finally snaps. "And not only you annoy me every damn day, but now I'm stuck with yer bloody whiny voice in me head, always pickin' holes in everything I do," he sniffs. "It's easier to humour you. It."

"Always listen to the voices," Sam tells him. "I get that a lot, too."

"They usually give the opposite advice," Gene comments. "I'll probably need an exorcist to get rid of you."

Sam barks a laugh, but it comes out strange, almost desperate. "You really don't want me in there, do you?"

"If I'm stuck with something bothering me either way, you're better than the animal in me guts any day," Gene shrugs and it takes Sam a moment to place the reference.

"Thanks," he says. "I guess."

Gene grunts in acknowledgement, then he struggles up to a kneeling position, grabbing his shoulders and lifting him up. "Come on, Tyler," he says. "It's past your bed time."

"What do you know about my bed time?" Sam snorts, but accepts his help anyway, until they're more or less upright again.

He starts tilting sideways, and Gene's hand shoots out to steady him. They almost fall down again.

"You came to me," he says, then. "When you- You came to me."

"Yes, Tyler, I did," Gene rolls his eyes.

"You trust me."

Gene starts tugging him towards the exit, and Sam stumbles against his side, his arms going around his neck to keep himself upright, and ending up being dragged by his Guv, more than supported.

"Get off, you poof," Gene says, batting his hands away, but they're still moving, and Sam trips over his own feet, sprawling to the ground this time. "Oh, for God's sake!"

"Gravity hates me today," Sam informs him, from the floor.

Gene stoops down and hooks his hands under his armpits, pulling him upright. Sam ends up with his face plastered against his shirt once again.

"Really, Tyler, I know yer little girly heart must be all a-flutter," Gene snorts, "but you're takin' way too many liberties with me personal space."

The hands supporting him don't leave, though, and they stand like that for a minute, in a weird embrace.

"You trust me," Sam says. "Why?"

"Aren't you full o' questions tonight?" Gene says, and turns him around, slipping Sam's arm around his neck, and circling his waist with his own.

They start making their somewhat teetering way down the corridor.

"You trust me," he repeats. "I'm not sure you should."

Gene hesitates for a moment, but then he resumes walking. "Why not?"

"There are things-" he starts. "I don't know. I'm not- sure."

"Well, that's the only thing that's clear, Tyler," Gene replies.

Sam frowns, there has to be a way he can explain. "Morgan," he says, at last. "He made me an offer."

Gene stiffens under him. "What kind of offer?"

"Gene, I-" he shakes his head. "It's complicated, I'm confused. There are things I don't understand."

"What's unusual, then?" Gene asks, then he stops and turns to study him. "You gonna accept his offer?"

"I don't know him," Sam replies, as if that somehow could explain things.

Gene seems satisfied with that, though, and with a curt nod, he resumes walking, their steps echoing hollowly in the unlit corridor.

He doesn't know Morgan.

But Morgan seems to know him very well.


End file.
